


(non)ideal composition

by ThatGirlTheyKnow



Category: Skulduggery Pleasant - Derek Landy
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Ignores a lot of canon, Undefined Timeline, sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-13
Updated: 2013-12-13
Packaged: 2018-01-04 10:36:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1080000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatGirlTheyKnow/pseuds/ThatGirlTheyKnow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"She imagines reaching her hand in and pulling out his heart, red and alive and bloody, and showing it to him as proof that he can feel, that he can feel all that she feels. But she can't, because that heart was long gone."</p>
            </blockquote>





	(non)ideal composition

**Author's Note:**

> So I don't really know. I wrote this late at night (like most of my stories). I've only recently started writing for this fandom again, so I'm still feeling a bit off, but I think this one is pretty good. I was going to make it a part of a series with my AU oneshot "When The Moon Gets Tired" but I decided not to, as that would just add too much angst for me to deal with.

They lay on their sides on the bed, facing each other, with barely a hand's width between them. She works the buttons of Skulduggery's shirt with shaking fingers until it falls open.

Valkyrie traces each of Skulduggery's ribs with an odd type of determination. Her eyes slip closed, but her fingers brush gently along the white bones, one at a time, until, on a whim, she stops. She slides two of her fingers between two ribs, and Skulduggery makes a small, aborted noise.

"Valkyrie," he says. He sounds as though he's choking.

Valkyrie pulls out her fingers, resting them lightly on top of the bones. She opens her eyes and her fingers are directly above where Skulduggery's heart would be. She wonders if she hurt him. She imagines reaching her hand in and pulling out his heart, red and alive and bloody, and showing it to him as proof that he can feel, that he can feel all that she feels. But she can't, because that heart was long gone.

"I'm sorry," she whispers.

"Don't be. It's fine." He brings his hands up to rest of the back of her head, and he pulls her forward so her face is tucked under his chin. "It's fine."

Her hand is still on his ribs, trapped between them, and Skulduggery is all hardness and angles, but she is comfortable, in a way, and closes her eyes again.

She sleeps, and she dreams of phantom hearts that beat with the echoes of love. She wakes up sweating.

|o|o|o|o|o|

Valkyrie stares at Skulduggery's face. It is not his. There is skin and there are eyes and there is an artificial look about it.  She thinks she might hate it.

"Turn it off," she says. They're sitting at the dinner table and she's eating while he's waiting, but she keeps getting distracted, because the man looking at her is not Skulduggery.

He takes off the facade, and a bit of tension releases itself from Valkyrie's shoulder. "Much better," she tells him, and offers him a small smile. She feels as though he smiles, too. She stares at his face again, his real face. She reaches a hand over their small table and brushes her knuckles against his cheekbone. "I like you this way."

"I would have thought you preferred me with a face."

"You have a face," she says. "It's just not like other people's faces."

"I would have thought that you preferred me with a face like other people's."

"You would have been wrong. I prefer you as you, not as that."

"Odd," he murmurs. "I'm not in the habit of being wrong."

She scoffs.

"You like kissing that face," Skulduggery says, and his tone is different. Not quite unsure, and a bit like he’s trying to get her to understand something he doesn’t quiet understand.

"I would rather be kissing... you."

"You mean my original face?"

"No. I mean... you. You with your skull, only your skull, but kissable."

"I don't think that's possible," he says softly. Apologetically.

"I fell in _love_ with you and your skull," Valkyrie says, trying to explain, and her voice sounds desperate. How can she make him understand how she feels? “I fell in love with a skeleton.” She stands up and walks around the table. He turns his chair to face her. She grabs his hands and pulls him up, and kisses his teeth.

“I can’t kiss you back,” Skulduggery says. “I want to kiss you back, but I can’t.”

“Do you think I’m crazy? Disturbed? For falling in love with you?”

“How could you help but love me?” he says, with a smile in his voice. “It’s hardly surprising. Then again, how could I help but love you?”

“That’s not much of an answer.”

Silence. Then, “I do think only a madwoman would fall in love with a dead man.”

“You’re much more than a dead man. To me, at least.”

He brushes her hair out of her face and cups her cheek with his gloved hand. “To you.”

|o|o|o|o|o|

When Valkyrie wakes up she is alone, but when she rolls onto her back, she sees Skulduggery, standing at the foot of the bed. His clothes are gone, and he is standing completely still. Her eyes follow every curve of every bone, every line and every slope and every bump. When she is done, she stands up and takes off her clothes, one by one, and they stand in front of each other, naked. They haven’t done this before, haven’t felt the need before, to expose themselves this fully, but now it is urgent, like they have something to prove. Valkyrie’s heart is beating, hard and fast, but she doesn’t move, doesn’t speak, just lets Skulduggery drink her in.

His hands reaches out, and he touches her neck, then her collarbone, down to her breasts and then to her stomach. She’s shivering and something tells her that he is, too.

“Look at you, Valkyrie. You’re so beautiful.”

“You are, too,” she says truthfully, even though she doesn’t know why, but she can’t take her eyes off the bright, white bone in the dull light of the streetlamps that shine through the window, the gaps in the long shadows he casts.

“You’re flesh, and blood, and you’re warmth. What are you doing with me?”

“Being happy. Being with the man I love.”

“I’m not good for you. I can’t give you what you need, Valkyrie.”

Valkyrie frowns. “I don’t need anything. Not from a man, not from anyone. You give me what I want.”

“I can’t make love to you,” he says.

“Do you want to?” she asks. She tries not to blush.

“Of course I want to. But I can’t. I can’t give you a normal, proper relationship.”

Valkyrie almost laughs. She settles for a grin. It’s sad and it feels like her face is about to break apart, but it’s still a grin, and there’s still humour behind it. A part of her wants to cry, cry from happiness because this skeleton, this remarkable man, loves her so much. From sadness because this skeleton, this remarkable man loves her so much and doesn’t think he deserves her.

“You know,” she says, and takes a step forward. “For a genius, you’re not very bright.”

“Oh?” As if on instinct, he rests a hand on her hip.

“Really, when has anything about us ever been normal?” She reaches out and touches him, runs her hands down his arms and over his ribcage and along his spine and everywhere. Just as he traced her body, she traces his, and she is breathless and he is silent.

“I just want you,” she whisper, and she kisses him, and would not replace the feeling of cool bone against her lips for anything else.

|o|o|o|o|o|

_"He sighed, and his hands settled on her shoulders. The others were warm and their embraces strong – with Skulduggery the hug was cold, and there were areas on his jacket that gave way beneath her fingers, and she could feel the emptiness within. She didn’t mind." – Last Stand of Dead Men_

 


End file.
